Friday, June 29, 2012

United Nations Leadership

A country that poses a very real threat to regional security, one
moreover whose human rights record is so perversely blemished manages by
some miraculous sleight-of-mind to present as a member in good standing
of the United Nations, the very body that has led in exacting
economically ruinous sanctions in response to its unauthorized uranium
enrichment program. Yet this very same country is seen quite obviously
as one to be respected as witnessed by the fact that the United Nations
holds conferences in its capital city of Tehran.

Knowing
full well that given that international forum the Islamic Republic of
Iran will speak to any topic of general attention, somehow managing to
inveigle absurdly slanderous accusations against the State of Israel as
being the fount of all evil in the world. Amazingly, in attendance at
these conferences are not only human-rights-abusing states whose record
of abuse is only minimally less invasive than Iran's, but also
diplomatic envoys of advanced European states.

Their
acquiescence to such scenarios is implicit, in that when they become
part of such gatherings and are exposed to the incredibly image-damaging
rants of the vice-president of Iran vilifying Israel, claiming it to be
involved in all manner of pernicious schemes to bring misery to the
world, there is no one present who would bother to demonstrate the
merest contempt for such mind-boggling and vicious inanities.

And
so, those gathering in Tehran for a UN-sponsored conference on drug
trafficking hear out instead the ravings of rabidly hateful accusations
against a country and its people having nothing whatever to do with the
matter under discussion. But their very presence in the country of a
nation whose leaders have gone out of their way to repeatedly threaten
violence of obliteration against another country serves to give
legitimacy to that country's assertions.

The western
delegates at the UN global drug enforcement conference in Tehran were
treated to an extraordinary spectacle as Iran's Vice President Mohammad
Reza Rahimi roused himself to an inflammatory speech against Israel,
claiming the Talmud "teaches them how to destroy non-Jews so as to
protect an embryo in the womb of a Jewish mother". A perplexing
accusation that must have whirled about in the mind of a fanatic
determined to instill dread and distaste in the minds of like-minded
bigots.

"Zionists", he claimed are responsible for the
trafficking of illicit drugs throughout the world. "You cannot find a
single addict among the Zionists", he claimed. The idea being that Jews
infect others with the germ of narcotic addiction, but yet are
themselves usefully immune from contracting that very same disease,
armoured with the wish, presumably, to destroy other societies, not
their own. This kind of nonsensical, childish nonsense emanating from
the mind of a high ranking government official boggles the mind.

The New York Times
which appears to have covered the UN-sponsored conference titled
International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking, wrote that
this man with the truly troubled mind echoing the prevailing official
opinion of his peers, confidently asserted that Zionists order
gynecologists to kill black babies. What's more, he had inside
information that the 1917 Russian Revolution was initiated by Jews - and
tellingly, none, he said, died in it. Though if any of them heard what
he had to say they might have died laughing.

That
credibility would be given this kind of incredible claptrap by those
present and hearing out the hateful messages would simply listen and
report on what they had heard, without anyone lifting a voice to
challenge the mindset that conceived of such legendary absurdities,
speaks volumes about the general atmosphere that dominates at all United
Nations-sponsored events.

One Western diplomat present
at the event claimed that the 10-minute speech had him "really shocked
and surprised". So shocked and surprised, evidently, that his reason
and his voice left him shell-shocked, incapable of responding
intelligently, rationally, and with the conviction of having the truth
at his recall. "We've heard speeches like this before but this was so
much worse than the usual rhetoric. This wasn't about drugs. It seems
the Iranians want to create an issue and are deliberately looking to
stir things up", the diplomat elaborated.

And as long
as those who know better but hold their counsel allow that perfervid
nonsense to go unchallenged, Iran will continue to consider its
outrageously lunatic and dangerous slanders to be perfectly acceptable,
in fact validated by all those who are exposed to it. Catherine Ashton,
the EU's foreign policy chief responsible for negotiating with Iran on
behalf of six world powers with respect to nuclear talks that lead to no
solutions whatever, reacted by saying the speech was anti-Semitic,
"unacceptable".

Those present at the conference appear to have thought it completely acceptable.

This represents a general opinion site for its author. It also offers a space for the author to record her experiences and perceptions,both personal and public. This is rendered obvious by the content contained in the blog, but the space is here inviting me to write. And so I do.